4-years old boy beaten to death on birthday

[Carolynn]

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/ ... h-birthday

This is a sad, sad story. And this is not an isolated incident. There is soooo much violence perpetrated by men on women and children, and our male run societies largely ignore it. Makes me need to VOMIT!!!

There is NEVER, NEVER, NEVER a reason to kill a child. There is NEVER, NEVER, NEVER a reason to kill children. There is NEVER, NEVER, NEVER justification for killing a woman for trying to protect her life and/or her child/children. Violence against women and children is an epidemic.

Does anyone doubt the central thesis of DEMONIC MALES, by Richard Wrangham and Dale Peterson (1996) when you read or hear of these viciously violent acts?

[SilverLady(SO)]

Yelling is another form of violence, and it's also abusive. Yes, I'm talking about your typing in all caps, which is also known as yelling or shouting . . .

. . . and you are yelling at everyone here, and venting your frustrations on us . . .

. . . why???

Mind you, I am not condoning what happened - far from it - I just want to know why you feel the need to yell at us???



- SL

[Absaroka]

I don't have a problem with the CAPS, as this is something worth yelling about, and I did not feel it was directed towards the forum members. But Carolyn I do think that the post is promoting an us vs them stance of men vs women and children. It is worth noting that approximately half of all children are also male, and so your post is as far as I can see relegating half of humanity to demonic status, which is simple bigotry.

Perhaps the article about demonic males that you cite has a different stance, I haven't read it.

It's worth noting that most men in our society at least are raised by women. As the Catholic church says, if you let us have someone for their first 5 years the rest is less important. Who is usually in charge of that first 5 years of a childs life?

I'd modify your statement to simply say that violence is an epidemic, although on a world wide basis the world is actually becoming less violent, perhaps because our weapons are becoming so much deadlier. And although much of the violence is committed by men, when we consider that we comprise half of humanity and are absolutely dependent on both men and women for the continuation of the species, I don't think we should single out men.

Zari

[Anita]

Hi Carolynn--
I'm sorry that you have to deal with such strong feelings about men's violence. In my experience, feelings like that end up hurting me, because there's little I can do about it. You personally can’t stop this kind of thing from happening. The all-caps get to me, the same way they get to Silverlady. At the same time, I understand that you’re really upset about this, and you’re expressing your feeling about it.

I searched for a Mother Teresa quote that I remembered from long ago. The closest I came to finding it was this. Author Brian McDonald is quoting her in a book he wrote called The Golden Theme.

Brian McDonald wrote:

Mother Teresa, who spent her life caring for the dying and the poor, said she dedicated herself to doing so "on the day I discovered I had a Hitler inside me."

I also know that I’ve been capable of great violence when I was younger. I could have hurt someone badly if I hadn’t been restrained. I know that “there but for the grace of God goes I,” in regard to what this man did.
I never got that angry at a child, but I know the feelings that extreme anger bring out.
It changes my reaction to it. While I can agree that it’s terrible that it happened, my understanding of how that type of thing happens is all too clear to me.

Being a trans woman has also allowed me to hear genetic women talk about taking testosterone. I’ve heard three FtMs talk about it, and how they experienced the negative side of it. They said they understood men in a way that they never could have any other way. That was very validating to me, that they acknowledged that at least some of the violence and the sexual aggression occurred in them, too, whether they liked it or not. Testosterone is not an excuse for everything that men do, by any means. It does have an effect.

[Paula G]

I wanted to respond t this post as soon as I saw it on Sunday, but struggled to know how to respond.

We do life in a mad, bad, sad, world, with some mad, bad sad people in it. Not all men are mad, bad or sad but some are, all we can do is to try to make it a little better. Getting angry with it only helps if that anger is channelled e.g. the Civil Rights movement in the US.

[Susan]

I too do not understand this

I have never laid a finger in anger against my wife and my kids only had one clobbering rule when they were little, NO BITING

They are 23 and 22 now and very happy and balanced adults, the few spankings I administered didn't do them any harm.

The world can be a nasty place at times.

[Absaroka]

Thinking about this further I have to ask Carolynn why did you post your comments on a forum who's membership is mostly male? Sure there are some transfolk and also some female SOs, and even one or two female crossdressers. But the vast bulk of the membership here is male, even if we like to wear women's clothes and use women's names. Are we demons too?

Zari

[Anthony Simon]

I personally think of the Devil as a kind of concentrated version of all the evil in man. As no man (I assume) can be purely good, there's always some room, at some times, for him (or me) to act in a devilish way. As to men acting in a more evil way than women, I doubt it. There's a famous, horrible, recent case in the UK, the Baby P case where the mother and her boyfriend were equally culpable in the murder of a 2 year old.

There are alsoo times and places which seem to bring out the absolute worst in the people. I'm sure we can all think of plenty from the last century. I happen to believe that, if we're not careful, we're going to head into another one. And, to me, the men look more susceptible to act in that way right now.

In other words, I think there is a point in worrying about this issue, if I wouldn't go as far as Carolynn.

[Carolynn]

OK folks. You wanna know why. OK.

On the 26th of Nov., I had gone to one of the local superstores that includes food in it's offerings, as well as sundries. and a plethora of other items. I needed Depends (tm) for my mother, milk and a few other odds and ends. I was avoiding any Christmas Shopping, which was the big event of the day. I had gotten my modest list filled, and stood at the incredibly long checkout, and finally cleared it. There were lots of kids with parents, most of them (the kids that is) tired,/cranky and crying.

I left the store, behind an at least 6 ft.tall man with a young (maybe 3 yrs. old or less), small crying child he was carrying at first, then he dropped him from his arms ( a distance of at least 3 1/2 feet) down on the ground where he fell, grabbed him by one arm and yanked him up onto his feet, though off balance. He dragged the kid by that arm, and twisted it to try to get him to his feet, and walked far too fast for a little kid his size to match his steps. The kid shrieked in pain with the arm twist and being dragged along. I know from personal experience that such injury can cause permanent damage to tendons of that shoulde).

I was close enough and I told him, out of horror over the treatment of a less than three years old kid, that he was hurting his child and shouldn't treat him that way. The Man, and a Man he most certainly was in all his arrogant glory, told me to "F--k off Bitch, I will discipline my child anyway I choose to", and it was "..none of my (two epithets) business."

Then he jerked the kid to his feet again, by the same arm the child had been cuddling to him during the seconds long exchange, and provoked another scream. So I asked him his name. He told me to "F--k Off, you meddling B--ch." and threw his child into the back seat of their car by the same arm. The childs head hit the top edge of the car door opening with an audible "thunk", more crying, and "No Daddy, No Daddy" as he reached in an struck the kid. Then the Man glared at me, got in his car, nearly ran me down backing out of the parking slot, and drove away. I was writing down his tag number and details of the car.

I called Norman Police (a male answered), told them about the guy mistreating his child with clear description of him and his car and tag number, and was told without me having his name they couldn't open a case file for a warrant. And besides, I shouldn't interfere with such angry people as they might attack me!! He wouldn't use the tag number to get a name, nor would he send out a car. The abuser had parked about 8 rows over from the scene of the incident, so I suspected he had other people in the store, and it would have been easy to block him in with a police car and at least have a talk with him. I would have been there to testify.

So I loaded my stuff into my car, thought about it, then called DHS. It was a weekend, and a holiday weekend at that. I got a voice mail with a number to call in an emergency for child welfare. I called it, a bored Male answered the phone, I explained, and he asked for the man's name and address. Again I had only the license number and description of the car, and he just couldn't do a thing, but if I found out who it was, they would open a file on the incident.

Meantime, I saw a woman, obviously pregnant, with three stair step kids tagging along, go to the car, they loaded up, and left. I tried to follow them but traffic lights were against me. I would have followed them home and done a reverse look up on their address to find out who they were. Kept them in sight until I was two blocks back as they hit the entrance to I-35, and after that there was no hope.

Then on the morning of the 27th, I read the article I referenced in the first post in this thread. And I had a belly full of it and I wrote what I wrote feeling disgust for the entire male half of the species, deserved or not. It's not that I don't like men, god knows. But there seems to be some men that should be castrated for the safety of the world, IMHO.

And yes there are many women who have killed their children, but it is sufficiently rare that it is a big news item when it happens.

Of course, I forgot that the people on this forum are primarily male, so of course I offended you. I apologize. I promise, I will not forget again.

And that was why I was yelling (though I didn't think of it as yelling, but as emphasis) about that 4-years old child being beaten to death by a stupid male many times his size, and that children should never, ever be abused.

I don't know why I am so upset. Of chimpanzee children who are killed and often eaten by their own extended family, 99% are killed by males (but they kill only the young not of theire genes) who also beat into submission and rape chimpanzee females (defined as not in estrus) apparently to "groom" her for future sexual advantage. And genetically speaking, human and chimpanzee DNA is really close. So why shouldn't their behavor be as well? I mean, what more can I expect? Something better from human males than come from other apes? I mean, really!!

As far as child abuse, women are charged with it more than men (57%), mainly because of the way it is defined. Women as the primary caregivers and in most frequent contact with children, are charged with emotional or physical neglect, which includes not feeding their children when they could and is considered child abuse. There is some physical abuse as well, in terms of slapping, hitting etc.

But as far as sex abuse of children goes, fathers, brothers, cousins, all of whom are members of the family and supposed to love and be loved, commit this offense more than 90% of the time (hmm, placed on a balance scale, emotional and physical neglect vs. violence and emotional blackmail used to compel sex, hmmm. Where is the balance?).

Murder of children is more frequent overall for men to commit, often (according to some religious apologists for males) in times of stress, economic, unemployment or whatever, putting males more often in contact with children on a long term basis.

Then there is the interesting statistic that step fathers and mothers are more likely to kill a child not their own than a biological child (just like Chimps, eh). Such a child is more often a victim of neglect and other abuse by a step mother as well. The fairy tales of evil stepmothers have some basis in fact, perhaps?

As far as rape between the two sexes, well over 85% is men on women. The rest is women acting like men, on men, and men on men with victims over 12 years of age, which is the cutoff (for some imponderable reason) between pedophilia and rape used by the Dept. of Justice statistics, though 16 is the legal limit on statutory rape.

The older I get the less tolerance I have toward those who claim humanity is something special and different. Despite our much vaunted abiltiy to supposedly tell right from wrong, we often do not act on that ability, at all levels of society.

Some days I think Armageddon or the Sun going Nova would be a really good idea.

Carolynn

[Absaroka]

Carolynn I've heard this sort of arguement in all it's permutations so many times I can't stand it.

Ususally it's along racial or ethnic lines. About how the vast majority of violent street crime is committed by Black people. About how white people have destroyed everything they touch on a world wide scale. About how Muslims seem incapable of governing themselves. About how most suicide bombers are Arab. How illegal Hispanic immigrants are taking work away from and abusing innocent American Blacks. About how doing business with Jews or Indians is a monumental chore. About how rich WASPS invariably think that either the world owes them a living or that they'e singlehandedly invented civilization.

Your sentence about female on male rape is women acting like men says it all.

Given your stance I wonder (rhetorically speaking) why you even care. The man was just abusing a male child. One of "them", who will grow up to be a man, the "other"

Bigotry is bigotry, period. Male bashing is bigotry and attempting to have any kind of moral high ground by claiming non male status is no different than Muhammed Khalid (remember him) saying that it is not racist to hate whites because black people are by definition not racist in a white racist society.


All that said, like you I'm not optimistic about the next hundred years of humanities future, let alone the next thousand. Probably the biggest leap of faith I've ever made was the simple decision to have children.

Zari

[Carolynn]

OK. I wrote about why I made my Nov. 27 post, as was requested, Zari.

You have suggested on the basis of part of the contents of that post that I am prejudiced against males. I really don't care if two males of comparable size in a bar want to beat each other to a pulp or pursue other forms of antler butting in a bar or on a playing field. There are males who believe physical prowress makes them more suited to reproduce because they are stronger or it feeds their egos, while others, being symbol using humans, will do the same by gathering and flaunting symbols of power or wealth, where those things differ. For them, the cool, costly items are the proof of superiority, and these behaviors are also reflected in nature, especially among birds. Neither do I care if two males, or females, get in a boxing ring to provide entertainment for gamblers and bloodthirsty "sports" that get excited to see them pummel each other about the head and body and gradually make each other more stupid.

I am prejudiced against adults, male and female, who use violence on the helpless or those less strong than them, and in response to your question as to why I should care about what happens to a male child, I really do not discriminate between the gender of the victims. Male child, Female child, or anywhere in between, for a larger juvenile or adult to beat or injure or otherwise abuse a child is just plain wrong, especially if that abuser is a parent. And statistics do show that both parents may physically abuse a child, but in cases of rape, it is most often a male perpetrator. Although it does occur that women kill their kids and at times their husbands, men are more likely to kill or attempt to kill their wives and their kids as well. News storys about these events are nearly daily, like this one from this morning:

http://usnews.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/ ... city-texas

And surviving children of abusers are likely, but not invaribly so, to be abusers of their own nuclear family members.

I am sorry if you find that unpalatable to your own prejudices. But then, prejudices are like belly buttons, eh? Everyone has at least one.

[Absaroka]

I agree with most of what you say Carolynn. I'm glad you were able to let go of the rant that it's just men.

Given the way most children will treat each other I'd say an awful lot of our problems are really just improperly socialized adults who still act like kids.

Zari